


for the sake of art

by preromantics



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Fluff, Gen Fic, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-05
Updated: 2012-09-05
Packaged: 2017-11-13 14:24:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,075
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/504437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/preromantics/pseuds/preromantics
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Some sort of vague AU wherein Liam is a nude model in Zayn's figure drawing class. (Harry/Nick, Harry/Louis, OT5 over/undertones.) / <i>It's Harry, exhibitionist that he is, that puts the idea in Liam's head, talking about making money on the side at the arts institute during their summer classes now that he's 18.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	for the sake of art

It's Harry, exhibitionist that he is, that puts the idea in Liam's head, talking about making money on the side at the arts institute during their summer classes now that he's 18.

"Like you even waited until you were 18 to take your clothes off in public places," Louis says, snorting. Harry kicks at his head from the couch and winds up on the floor before Liam can even blink down at them. 

"I didn't get paid for it before," Harry says. 

"Who'd pay to see that?" Niall asks.

Liam dutifully lifts his Playstation controller wires over where Harry and Louis have started rolling around. Next to him, Niall curses and flings his controller onto Liam's lap, sliding off the couch as Harry tugs at his ankles, yelling "it's art!"

Liam tries to play for a bit longer, even though Niall's character on the split screen is stuck not going anywhere, but the cords eventually get yanked out of the consol while Liam evades attack ("I didn't even say anything! I don't care what you do for money, Styles, as long as you give me my sock back.") and Liam has to give up and grab the lamp off the side table and hold it as everyone else fights their way out of the living room.

"We should really get the wireless controllers," Liam says, over the general chaos going on around him. They're more expensive, and it's not like the ones they have with the wires don't work, but it would be nice to have the wireless kind for days like this. 

"Why are you getting naked!" Niall yells from the kitchen. "No bits in the kitchen! It's a flat rule! Liam!"

And Liam mostly forgets about the whole getting naked for money thing after that.

-

Except then Liam starts thinking about how a little extra money might go a long way toward making their flat more like an actual place where some responsible adults live. 

Like, they could have more than one pan for when Louis is making eggs but Niall can't decide how he wants his eggs done, (only that he'd like them every way), or a set of guest sheets for when Harry's weirder friends pass out on the couch, or some sort of well-stocked first aid kit in the bathroom, or wireless Playstation controllers. 

He manages a week without bringing it up, and spends two days going the roundabout way to pick up take-out for dinner so he passes the arts institute just in case he wants to go in and inquire about things. 

"Do you have to be fully naked all the time, then?" he asks Harry, hoping both that Harry's sloshed enough to not remember in the morning and the loud music and voices surrounding the impromptu party that seems to be happening in their living room will drown his question out. 

Instead he gets a lapful of touchy-drunk Styles, yelling about pairing up to pose for his new sculptor friend Nick's erotic forms class in two weeks, and the entire party looking at them both.

-

Which is how, (look, Liam had to save face after that somehow, he's not ashamed of being naked, he just wasn't going to whip it out in the middle of his living room for a bunch of strangers to prove it, and no, not even if Harry did it first, jesus,) Liam winds up signing up to be a life model for the next round of figure drawing summer classes starting up at the institute the next morning. 

The girl doing the booking is overly appreciative, Liam thinks, until he learns that their last booked model had pulled out of his arrangement to do an exclusive daily thing with one of their other instructors over in the life sculpting advanced classes and the institute was scrambling to find someone who could be available for the rest of the summer for the three day a week courses.

("Should we have a talk about this sculptor guy?" Liam asks Harry over dinner, and Harry kicks his ankle under the table.

"I'm a big boy, no talk needed," Harry says, mouth open around his mouth full of noodles.

Louis nudges him after a pause where everyone gathered around the table looks awkwardly at each other. 

"Can we have a talk about it?" Louis asks, one eyebrow raised. "In detail?"

"Not in the kitchen," Niall says, and he ends up singing nonsense vowels loudly around mouths full of Thai noodles when Harry starts talking. 

Liam pats him on the back consolingly, eating with one hand, glad at least that no one's decided to talk with him about his new job.)

-

Objectively, Liam knows he's somewhat fit. He lives with three people who tell him so whenever he takes his shirt off, which is a nice ego boost, if not something that made Liam want to sleep with one eye open the first few weeks they all lived together after answering the same ad in the paper before school started up. 

(If he still sleeps with one eye open a year later, well, that's only because he's never sure who might crawl into his bed in the middle of the night, and it's hot out at night, not like they have a nice enough flat with central air, and he's fine with it now as long as it's not summer.)

The whole process is both less and more ridiculous than Liam expects. He's given a robe to change into in a little window-less office and reminded not to speak or laugh once he's chosen a pose, something lying down for today so it won't be too much strain. 

He mostly can't see anyone's face when he walks into the classroom, which helps. There are maybe twelve or so people gathered in a circle around a platform, big easels set up with stools, art boards blocking most of their faces. 

Liam takes a breath and disrobes, folding it up when it's all the way off to have something to look at for a moment before he sits down on the platform, acutely aware of the scrape of stools over the linoleum floor, people moving to get a better look at him. He arranges his legs out in front of him, taking up a pose he read online was easy to hold for a long period of time -- well, Niall read about it out loud for him, laughing before getting suspiciously silent, causing Harry to yell out, "No porn in the common spaces! Flat rule! Liam!" and another fight broke out and ended in nakedness, leaving Liam to wonder why he was taking this job to buy nice things for their flat in the first place -- and picks a point of focus to stare at for a little while, a window between two easels.

It's all a bit boring, by twenty minutes in. He's studiously avoiding actually looking at any of the heads poking around to look at him, listening instead at the light classical music the teacher has playing and the scratch-scratch noise of charcoal across paper that's filling the room. 

The person directly in front of him has feet that won't stop tapping on the floor, scuffed up converse with frayed shoelaces, and Liam's curiosity gets the better of him; he waits until the converse-guy's face comes around the edge of his easel, right in Liam's line of sight, to see what he looks like.

He has headphones in, face serious, and he doesn't even notice that Liam's staring at him before his head is disappearing again. Liam feels himself starting to flush for the first time, suddenly stupidly aware that he's being so focused on by this group of people, by headphone-converse-wearing guy, drawing him in detail as part of a class. 

It's a ridiculous thing to get worked up over -- and shit, not worked up like that, Liam knows Harry has like, spies in the art institute, he knew Liam signed up to be a model five minutes after the fact, texted him with gleeful exclamations, Liam would never live it down if he actually got worked up, physically -- but Liam shuts his eyes for the last hour of the class and ignores the tingling feeling in his arm where it's falling asleep supporting his head.

-

Liam's signed to model up for the whole course, three times a week for three weeks. It's a nice amount of money, for being just about the laziest job Liam could ever hope to get, and he'll get paid in full at the end, but after the first class he seriously considers backing out. Even if it means not getting his wireless controllers or frying pans.

"You could always do the erotic sculptures class with me," Harry offers, which makes up Liam's mind to stick out the figure drawing class, instead.

It would be stupid to stop doing it now that he's started, anyway, so he goes back. The second time he stands in fifteen minute poses, helped by ideas from the instructor, and tries not to look at where the same kid as before is situated in his line of sight, sketching out his stance with wide sweeps of his arms and a serious look on his face.

The third time Liam goes, he learns the guy's name is Zayn when the instructor says so, and Liam tries not to tap his feet for the last fifteen minutes while he watches Zayn's feet tap as he works, moving to whatever rhythm his headphones are providing.

\- 

The rent on their flat is being raised for the next year, because the area is getting more popular with students. 

"We should protest with signs," Harry says. He's sitting on the floor against Niall's legs, and Niall's asleep on the couch, hoodie drawn up over his face even though their fans are blowing hot air through-out the room. 

"It'll just be tighter," Liam says. He doesn't want to find new people to live with. He likes who he's got just fine, even if they're all less than sane. "We'll be fine."

"Yeah, you and Harry can just keep prostituting yourself in the name of art and we'll get by just fine," Louis says. Liam kicks at him, careful not to jostle Niall, but Louis just catches his ankle and rubs it with his thumb. 

"We could get another person?" Harry suggests, pulling a face. "Lou and I could share and we could split the costs differently."

"Aww," Niall mumbles, half-awake, turning into Liam's arm to shield his eyes from the TV glare, "when'd Harry get smart?"

"Maybe," Liam says. "If we can find someone."

"Not your sculptor friend," Louis says, poking Harry in the chest. 

"He's already got his own flat, and he lives there alone," Harry says, leaning up off of Niall's legs with his arms flailing toward Louis, tongue sticking out. 

"No naked, 's a rule," Niall mumbles into Liam's arm, and Liam shifts so they can both tuck their legs up on the couch and not get in the way of the tussle going on over the floor.

-

Liam shows up early to the arts institute for the start of the second week and nearly runs into Zayn as he turns the corner past the welcome desk after picking up his robe to change into. 

His feet screech along the floor as he stops, and Zayn looks up, startled, pushing a pin into the announcement board on the wall.

"Hey," Liam says, leaning against the wall like he didn't almost just trip over his own feet. 

"Oh, hey," Zayn says. "You alright?"

Liam nods, holding up the robe tucked under his arm. "Just on my way to change," he says. "I'm Liam, by the way. The guy you've been drawing. In the nude. Not just you, of course, everyone else has as well. Naked drawing. Well, I've just been the one --"

"Yeah," Zayn says thankfully cutting Liam off, and he looks Liam up and down with a little curl at the corner of his mouth in a way that makes Liam want to -- do something. "I'm Zayn."

Zayn reaches out a hand for Liam to shake but pulls it back almost as soon as he does, leaving Liam with a half-aborted hand motion toward him.

"Pins," Zayn says, opening his hand palm-up for Liam to see, three pushpins there. "Sorry, I forgot, that would've been unfortunate."

"No, it's fine," Liam says. He drops his hand, leans up off the wall.

"I was just pinning up an ad," Zayn says, waving a hand, head sort of ducked down like he's embarrassed by it. "I'm going to school in the area this year and I think my friend bailed on our plan to get a place together, so."

Liam realizes his answering grin is probably scarily intense, and he's happy to place the blame on his increasing lack of sanity on his flatmates, but he grins anyway, because it's like fate, if Liam believed in that sort of thing. Zayn is busy looking at the bulletin board, though, so Liam has time to arrange his face.

"They've just raised the cost of where I'm living with my friends," Liam says, "and we're looking for a fifth roommate in our three bedroom for this year."

"Yeah?"

"We were just talking about it last night, actually."

"Maybe we could get lunch after class," Zayn says, shrugging easily against the wall, converse scuffing on the floor. 

Liam's yet to have lunch with someone after been naked around them for two hours, so he figures he's overdue. He'll have two boring naked hours to figure out how to talk up Harry, Niall, and Louis without scaring Zayn completely.

"That would be great," Liam says, maybe a little too enthusiastic, but Zayn just grins quickly at him and leans back.

"I should get inside," he says.

"I should get un-- yeah, I'll be there in a sec," Liam says, holding his robe up again awkwardly as Zayn walks away, still grinning a little in a way that's so different from the serious face Liam is used to seeing him with while he's drawing, and much more attractive.

-

They end up going to lunch three times, barely even discussing the flat, before Liam is ready to introduce Zayn to everyone else. He kind of likes that he has someone to hang out with that doesn't hang out with everyone else, just like he's ended up liking his modeling gig after all. 

If both of those things somehow have to do with Zayn and Zayn being attractive when he smiles, or when he's serious, or when he has hands blackened by charcoal that leave finger prints on his thighs when he rubs his hands over them as Liam talks to him -- well. Liam's brain is nice enough not to connect those things and make him dwell on it. 

An impromptu party at their place the day before the last figure drawing summer class isn't Liam's first choice scenario to introduce everyone to Zayn, but at least they're all mostly sober and there aren't too many people crowding up the living room when he gets there with Zayn. After a brief tour, Zayn seems pleased enough that Liam doesn't want to push the issue.

Louis and Harry are mixing a scary concoction of drinks through most of their introduction, which means they are distracted enough to not come across full-force. Niall's introduction mostly involves his mouth full of fruit stolen from whatever Harry and Louis are doing with the alcohol, his eyes bright with a manic sort of glint that means he totally knows Liam wants this to go well and has just possibly figured out why. 

"Is that your flatmates in the corner?" Zayn asks later, tipping his drink toward the corner behind their flatscreen. 

Liam had sort of guided him over to the wall next to the kitchen where it was less crowded when the Rockband competition got started, because there were too many elbows and Liam thought they could talk about moving in, but Niall had followed and slumped against the wall next to him and they all ended up talking about nothing in particular. 

He looks over to where Zayn is pointing and finds Louis and Harry kissing in the corner in-between shared ships from the same drink -- he can see tongue from across the room. To be fair, the drink concoction they made is overly sticky and sweet, so it's probably that, and Liam is used to seeing tongue, but he groans anyway and chances a look at where Zayn is watching.

"You get used to it," Niall says, shrugging. 

Liam elbows him. They've just gotten Zayn to agree to consider moving in, they can't scare him away yet.

"What? You do. If I went over there right now, they'd be at it with me as well." Niall leans forward like he might be considering going over there to prove his point, standing up and narrowing his eyes toward the corner.

Zayn laughs, low and shaking against Liam's side. "So basically anybody's fair game, then?"

"No," Liam says, automatic, and Niall echos him. 

"I mean, Hazza might, but together it's mostly a flatmate privilege, I think," Niall says.

"So if I moved in?" Zayn asks, trailing off. Liam feels pretty out of his element. 

Niall grins, elbows Liam back. "Take your pick, mate! Liam would definitely snog you instead, if you rather."

Liam groans, pushing Niall away, about to open his mouth an apologize for his ridiculous friends, who are dirty liars -- who are sometimes liars, not right now, but that's just a detail Liam will leave out. 

Except before Liam can speak, caught up in pushing Niall away, Zayn says, "I'd rather, yeah."

"Oh," Liam says, dropping his hands from Niall's shoulders to look at where Zayn is leaning back against the wall. 

Zayn shrugs, ducks his head and looks up at Liam from under his fringe, shit, and Liam laughs because he's not quite sure what else to do with the feeling bubbling up in his stomach. 

"I'll email you with the numbers tomorrow morning, then?" he asks, only half-joking. 

"Sure," Zayn says, and then he's reaching out to pull Liam in by the waist with the hand not holding his half-full beer, wide palm splaying out over Liam's ribs. 

So maybe not the morning, then, if Liam's night goes well enough.


End file.
